ASSASSINATION IN ISRAEL: EGYPT

ASSASSINATION IN ISRAEL: EGYPT;Apathy Tinged With Anger In Cairo Over Mubarak Trip

By DOUGLAS JEHL

Published: November 9, 1995

CAIRO, Nov. 8—
In the heart of this sprawling capital's biggest slum, Sheik Mayhoub Nasser is not the only one still seething at the sight of President Hosni Mubarak standing on Israeli soil.

Mr. Mubarak's journey to pay tribute to Yitzhak Rabin has been welcomed elsewhere as a noble if overdue gesture. But in slums like Imbaba, whose poverty makes it fertile soil for Islamic militants, the President's visit to Jerusalem is seen by some as a crucial mistake.

"Mubarak has just signed his own death certificate," Sheik Nasser said this afternoon, speaking in his apartment here.

Although the sheik commands wide respect among his neighbors, he insisted he was not making a threat. And even in this impoverished neighborhood, the notion that Egypt's President is now at greater risk is an extreme view.

But the shiek expressed the frustration of many in saying that Muslims cannot tolerate a leader who would visit Israel when it still controls Jerusalem. Mr. Mubarak's predecessor, Anwar el-Sadat, visited Jerusalem in 1977, even before Egypt made peace with Israel. Four years later, he was assassinated by Islamic militants who were angered both by the peace accord the two nations reached in 1979 and by Mr. Sadat's visit.

Despite the peace, many in Egypt still look upon Israel as an enemy. And while Mr. Mubarak's careful words at Mr. Rabin's funeral on Monday stopped well short of an embrace, his supporters have hurried to head off charges that the President's presence was an affront to Islam.

The Government has taken pains to insist that Mr. Mubarak's first trip to Jerusalem since he took office in 1981 was a human gesture that did not carry political weight.

A lengthy editorial this morning in Al Ahram, the main Government newspaper, offered seven reasons for the visit, saying that on balance it had been justified by "the exceptional situation." And Mr. Mubarak, who had previously refused repeated invitations to Israel, has told reporters, "I don't consider this a visit."

With parliamentary elections just three weeks away, the Government is plainly concerned that opposition parties may seize on the visit to strengthen their attacks against a Government that some portray as hostile to Islamic leaders.

In interviews across Cairo today, it was evident that Mr. Mubarak's hope of avoiding a public backlash has been strengthened by comparisons between him and King Hussein of Jordan, whose more effusive eulogy to Mr. Rabin is being widely described here as offensive.

Indeed, by the standards of the student protests that followed Sadat's visit to Jerusalem 18 years ago, the reaction to Mr. Mubarak's journey has been muted. Under emergency laws that have banned street demonstrations since the Government began its crackdown against Islamic militants three years ago, only opposition newspapers like Al Shaab have called critical attention to what it described as Mr. Mubarak's visit to "occupied Jerusalem."

While many ordinary Egyptians said they were untroubled by the visit, the forceful antipathy expressed by Islamic militants suggested that the step so welcomed in the West may carry domestic consequences.

"It is not befitting an Arab and a Muslim leader to visit Jerusalem when it is still occupied," said Mohammed Ezzat, 21, a leader of Islamic students at Cairo University, where student union elections today pitted Islamic candidates against those from a Government-supported secular society.

"We should never have had relations in the first place with anyone who still occupies our land," he said.

In a barbershop in Imbaba, Hatem Gharieb, a restaurant worker, pointed with frustration to last month's vote by the United States Congress to move the American Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem by 1999, and said Mr. Mubarak's visit was "bad timing."

"This is a mistake," Mr. Gharieb said, adding that Mr. Mubara "was not adding anything to Egypt by going there."

Only three years ago the Government dispatched 14,000 troops to Imbaba as part of its crackdown on Islamic militants, and the firm hand Cairo has wielded across Egypt has left many people reluctant to express dissent.

Sheik Nasser, one of several imams in his local mosque, was unusual in his neighborhood today only for allowing his name to be used as he criticized Mr. Mubarak's visit as an endorsement of Israel's control of Jerusalem.

"It is bad for both Arabs and Muslims," said the religious leader, an impoverished former chicken merchant who had to tug at his shabby djellabah to hide its holes.

The newspaper also said right-wing Israeli forces would have seized on Mr. Mubarak's absence to obstruct the peace effort. It said the unusual circumstance of Mr. Rabin's death provided Egypt with an "ideal opportunity" to put an end to American and Israeli complaints about the Egyptian President's long-standing refusal to visit Jerusalem.

On Cairo's crowded sidewalks, bustling campuses and dusty back streets, men like Mukhtar Ali made it clear that they were more concerned with their own affairs than with such debate. Smoking a water pipe in a coffee shop in Imbaba, Mr. Ali, a 33-year-old civil servant, shrugged his shoulders and told a visitor that what Mr. Mubarak did was "a human gesture."

But Hend Mohammed, 21, a Cairo University student whose hair and face were shrouded in a veil, said Mr. Mubarak's visit was a major misstep. "For the President to visit Jerusalem, it is a big risk," she said. "For Rabin to be buried in Jerusalem, that's a tragedy."

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16 Wounded in Train Attacks

ASYUT, Egypt, Nov. 8 (Reuters) -- Two Egyptians and two tourists were wounded in an attack tonight on a passenger train near Farshut, in southern Egypt, the authorities said.

It was the second shooting attack on a train in two days. Twelve Egyptians were wounded on Tuesday night when a train speeding through southern Egypt was raked with bullets.

Security officials said today that they suspected the attackers in both instances were Muslim militants. The Tuesday attack was the first of its kind since March, when four Egyptians were killed in a train attack.

Foreign tourists have been a prime target for Muslim militants trying to weaken the Government.